


unstrap him from the chair and put him back in his cage

by olavidalo



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, Attempted Coercion, Casual Ableism, M/M, WIP Amnesty, background cisswap, implications of dub-con, misleading implications
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-16
Updated: 2013-01-16
Packaged: 2017-11-25 17:49:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/641423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/olavidalo/pseuds/olavidalo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Character A is a superstar who's recently left the business for an extended country holiday; Character B is a local. Age-difference (Character B is at least 17).</p>
            </blockquote>





	unstrap him from the chair and put him back in his cage

**Author's Note:**

> All lies. Unbeta'ed and unbritpicked lies. Title from Lupe Fiasco's "Superstar."

A-Side. 

 

The man three tables over was quite pretty. Bit low-key, scruffy; clearly trying to hide it behind his upturned collar.

'Harry, I wish you wouldn't stare.' Harry blinked. His mother had stopped digging through her pouch and was looking at him. He smiled. 

'Sorry, Mum.' His mother's face melted into a smile, easy, just like that. She returned to digging. Harry returned to staring. 

The man was looking at him now. Harry smiled blandly and stared at his green beans. 

'Oh my--' Gem snorted aloud. 'Is that Zayn Malik?' Her elbow almost knocked Harry's cup over. A good bit sloshed over the edge. 'Oh, shite.' 

'Language. Who's Zayn Malik?' his mother asked, still nose deep in her pouch.

'He was part of that group, you know, that old boyband. That girlfriend of yours was always going on about them, wasn't she, Harry?'

Er, 'that girlfriend of yours'? Margie hadn't been into boybands much. Nor had Emmy, or Roberta, or Leah, or Prudence, or Tash... Ah. Gem had to be referring to Suri. Dear Suri Islington. With mild dismay, Harry did recall a brighter, blander version of Zayn Malik's face spread out over grotesquely aquamarine bedroom walls. He'd even been plastered all over the ceiling, 'so you could imagine him watching while you were having a fuck.' (Suri's words.) 

Brrr. That had been a confusing period in his sexual history.

'They were called New Directions, I think,' he muttered. He blotted the water with his napkin and stared at Malik from beneath his hair.

'Oh, like in that show, whatsit--Haply?' muffled his mother. Was she smelling for her wallet? Ah, Mum.

'It's called Glee, Mum,' said Gem, with an indulgent smile. Malik flinched.

'They came out before, I'd wager,' said Harry, amused.

'I'd heard he was moving up north but I'd never thought he'd move here,' said Gem. She'd a laugh like a hair toss. Brilliant. 'Can you imagine? After he cheated poor Koby Tilan for that young thing?'

Malik's shoulders were practically around his ears. It was empty around them; he was guaranteed to overhear. Besides that, Gem had inherited their mother's moral aversion to whispering.

'Oh, who's this Koby Tilan, then?' she asked. Her entire arm was now in her pouch.

'His boyhood boyfriend,' Gem said, pushing her salad underneath her turkey. (She was trying to be healthy these days.) 'Threw him over for blow and teenaged boys.'

'Well, that's not very nice,' concluded his mother, a bit smugly. She'd unearthed her wallet. 'Sounds like he lives a lonely life.'

Malik scowled and glanced at their table. Harry winked. Malik looked away.

'No point in being lonely,' he agreed.

 

B-Side. 

 

The Maliks were all anyone seemed to talk about.

'Would you like me to call Mr Malik?' trilled Mrs Hampshire from across the street, the morning Harry moved in. 'He's got a moving business on the side.'

Harry blinked, shifted the weight of three boxes, and smiled. 'No. Thank you!'

'Oh, Mrs Malik made those,' chuckled Mohinder Keating, when Harry came into the bakery for two more scones in as many days. 'See if you can get the recipe out of her. I've been trying to for ages.'

'I'll see what I can do,' said Harry, and grinned.

'Doniya Malik could do up your brakes with her eyes closed,' sighed Annie the mechanic, apropos of Harry asking how much it would take to replace his wipers.

Harry rubbed at his eyes so she wouldn't see him roll them.

'You should see those Malik girls dance,' gushed Mrs Somers, who was kind enough to join Harry on his morning runs even when she hadn't been invited. 'Cute as buttons, they are. My little Jeffrey fancies a different one every day.'

'I'm beginning to think everyone fancies the Malik family,' Harry muttered.

'Ought to ask Zain Malik about clearing your yard,' Mr Norham suggested one early morning, about three weeks after Harry had moved in. 'He'll clear it for free. Very enterprising lad, he is. Going to uni on a scholarship. Really quite clever, 'd you know?'

Harry, half-naked, three-fourths asleep, and in dire need of a paper and a wank, realised abruptly that he was damn tired of hearing all about the Maliks.

'No, I did not know,' he said, with more rigor than he properly felt. He slammed the door.

After that, they left him alone.

Mrs Hampshire made aggressive pruning motions whenever they both happened to be outside at the same time. Mohinder stopped giving him the newcomer's discount. Annie always put the 'At Lunch' sign up whenever he came by with his car, even when he tracked her down at 7 AM. ('I'm trying a new diet,' she said curtly.) Mrs Somers deliberately ran on the other side of the pavement in the morning.

Mr Norham started leaving pink-slipped fines on his door for 'improper yard maintenance.' Harry paid each and every one. He didn't bother taking them down, either. 

He started getting fines on his door for not taking the fines off his door. He paid those, too. 

By August, his door was papered over twice in pink. Mr Norham had moved onto light blue paper. 

His phone died from all the missed calls.

One morning, he opened the door to go for a run when he found a tall, overly pierced teen standing on his porch. There were pink and blue fines stuffed under his left arm.

They blinked at each other for a moment.

Piercings broke first and smiled. His lip ring caught the sun. 'Er, hullo. Sorry, I just thought Norham was being a bit of an idiot,' he said. He shrugged tightly. 'Wasteful, like.'

'He'd cut out a rainforest's worth of slips if it'd get me to cut my grass,' Harry said, swallowing some mild affront. No need to toss someone's goodwill in their face.

Piercings laughed. Was his tongue pierced? 'Hey, I could clear up your yard, f'you like,' he said. 'No fee. I like hard work.'

'Do you now,' Harry said, because he quite literally could not help himself.

Piercings blinked and then smiled. 'Ah, yea?' he said. 'I'm good for anything, really.'

'And what's your price?' Harry said, shutting the door. Piercings didn't move backwards, even though Harry was looming a bit.

'Price?' echoed Piercings. 'I don't, I don't have a price.'

How cute. The door made a rustling noise where he leaned back against it. 'Everyone has a price.'

'Well, I don't really need any money,' Piercings said, clearly uncomfortable. 'I'm, er, a bit rich, actually.'

'Are you? Well, so am I,' said Harry.

'You are?'

'Excruciatingly.' Well. Bit of an overstatement, that.

'Don' look it.'

Said the boy in the ratty leather vest. 'Neither do you.' Harry smiled sunnily. Piercings looked embarrassed. 'Clearly we'll need to bargain with something other than money.'

Piercings bit his lip. 'Well, you're Harry Styles, aren't you? My aunt used to play your music all the time,' he said. Harry's stomach clenched. 'Could you--could you give me some vocal lessons some time?'

What kind of unimaginative-- 'And they say the children are our future,' Harry muttered. 'Alright. You can come by tomorrow afternoon.' Piercings grinned. Come to it, it was unlikely that his mother would've named him Piercings. 'Give us your name, then.'

'Oh, my name's Zain Malik,' said Zain Malik, rubbing the back of his neck. 'Sorry. Guess I figured you would've heard of me by now."

Harry threw his head back and laughed. When he'd quite finished, he realised Zain was staring at him.

'Quite looking forward to it, then, Mr Malik,' said Harry.

'Yea,' said Zain, in a different tone altogether, low and curious. 'Yea, me too.'

 

A-Side.

 

'Bit young to be talking like that, aren't you?' Malik said. He didn't look especially turned on. Rather confused, actually.

Harry shrugged. 'I'm not asking you to marry me,' he said. 'Just looking for a fuck.'

Malik smiled. He still looked confused. 'I think I would be more comfortable with the proposal.'

'Alright, then. Zayn Malik, formerly of New Directions, cur-r-rently of Bridley Square, will you marry me? There are no downsides. We, we won't even have to have a ceremony, we can just skip straight to the dirty, emotionally detached sex.'

'Well, when you put it like that,' laughed Malik. 'The proposal sounds even worse.'

Harry frowned. Malik blew smoke at him and grinned. Suri had neglected to mention anything about him being such an enormous prick when he'd called earlier.

'I saw that video, you know,' Harry said without thinking. Why call it liquid courage when they could just call it liquid idiocy instead? Malik stopped smiling. 'No, I meant--I'm a good age, aren't I? Isn't that what you like?' What the fuck, why was he making this sound as _creepy as humanly possible_? Je-sus.

Malik flicked his cig at the ground and crushed it with what Harry thought was an undue amount of force. 'You don't know anything about me, mate.'

'Well, why don't you teach me, then--' then, attempting to lean sexily against Malik's hip, he whispered: 'I'm a quick learner.'

Malik gave him a cold once-over. 'I've better things to do with my time.' He pushed himself off the wall in one roiling movement.

Harry caught Malik by the waist and pulled him forward, wondering where'd his tongue had got to.

'Come on,' he whispered, a little uneven. God, he was more pissed than he'd thought. 'Be good.'

An elbow caught him in the ribs out of nowhere. Malik had just--! Malik had just _elbowed_ him! Harry doubled over, more in surprise than in pain, really. He would just be a moment, he was only catching--only catching his-- _ahhhhhh_ \--

'You've really nice shoes on,' he wheezed. 'What are those, patent leather?' 

'None of your fucking business,' hissed Malik, somewhere above him. 'Stay away from me.' 

So. That went well.

 

B-Side.

 

'Oh,' said Zain flatly, the next day.

'"Oh"? Is there something wrong with the piano? Can you not read music?'

'No, no, it's fine,' he mumbled, into his wrist. His enthusiasm was overwhelming, truly. 'I mean, eh, yea, I can read music.' He shifted from side-to-side in front of the window, splotchy around the sunlit edges of his shirt. Harry squinted, then wiped his glasses on his jeans. When he put them back on, Zain was still just standing there, clearer than before and no less awkward. Was he waiting for a diamond-encrusted invitation? Harry strangled his impatience and gently patted the stool beside him.

'Alright then. Sit.'

Zain sat.

He did halfhearted vocal exercises for 15 minutes--he actually had a decent voice when he managed to get his runs under control--before he bit his ringless lip and said: 'Ehm.'

Harry took his glasses off. Faking a smile was like putting on a pair of old trainers. 'There a problem? You seem uncomfortable.'

'I'm not,' Zain muttered, looking uncomfortable.

'You keep fidgeting.'

'No, I don't,' Zain muttered, bouncing his leg. 

Harry stared at him. Zain frowned at the piano.

'Look. If you've other things you'd rather be doing--'

'Yea, 'd rather be having sex, honestly,' Zain said. 

...Was he mental? As if Harry was the one who'd suggested vocal lessons. Well. It wasn't like Harry'd spent three hours cleaning up the parlour or anything. 

'Far be it from me to keep you from your girlfriend, mate,' he said, patting him on the back. He could use a nap, anyhow. These days he was a midday beer away from turning into his mother.

Zain smiled thinly. 'I don't have a girlfriend.'

Oh. Was that--did he want a pat on the shoulder now or--? Harry shrugged equably. 'Far be it from me to keep you from your boyfriend...? Whatever you like. You can go.'

Zain rolled his eyes--actually rolled his eyes, what was going on here? 'I don't have a boyfriend either.' And then he quite deliberately put his hand on Harry's thigh.

Well. Fuck.

Harry stood up and walked to the window. Surely the curtain was in dire need of tugging. 'Ha ha, ahhh, yea, probably not, no.'

Zain scowled and stood up too. 'I didn't come here for actual vocal lessons, you know.'

 _Clearly_. Harry wasn't an idiot. Well, not much of one. 'But singing is such a, a wholesome activity, ha ha.' Wrinkling a curtain was somehow less cathartic than squeezing a stress ball.

'Well, you gave it up, didn't you.' 

Harry felt his smile shrivel. Little prick. 

'No, I didn't mean--forget I said that. Only--you were flirting with me before, weren't you? Yesterday.' 

Harry wanted to fling himself against the wall. He settled for smoothing down the curtain instead. 'Only a little,' he said vaguely. Had he even bought these curtains? 'I hardly expected you to take me seriously.'

'Only--' Zain drifted a little closer. 'I wouldn't mind it if--'

Downstairs, someone knocked as if the dogs of hell themselves had beset them. 

'There is a God,' Harry whispered thankfully. He tried to navigate his way around Zain but he kept getting in his way--oh, sure, inconvenience your way into someone's bed, brilliant plan--and finally he just pushed him up against the wall.

Zain went easy (he was actually pretty thin) but then he wasn't struggling anyhow--and for a moment, Harry thought, _hmm_ \--but then he said, 'Would you just--' and would have added 'leave it,' only by then Zain had leaned up and kissed him.

Turned out his tongue was pierced.

'You need to work on your technique,' Harry said blankly, when Zain pulled back. 'You lack -- finesse.' Very profound, Mr Styles.

'I'm okay with it, you know,' said Zain. His hands were crumpling up the back of Harry's shirt. It would have been cute, except he was also trying to press his crotch against Harry's at the same time.

'Okay? Okay with what?' Harry echoed lowly. He could keep Zain's hips still against the wall with one hand, Je-sus. Zain tipped his head back and shut his eyes half-way.

'I wouldn't mind doing that stuff,' he whispered, low-lidded. 'Like in that video?' 

His head jerked back against the wall in gentle surprise -- _thdd_ \-- when Harry pulled away entirely. 'Hm, terribly sorry about the misunderstanding,' he said, dragging out the smile'd that gotten him through the car accident, the divorce, the awards show last year. Like a pair of old trainers, was it? 'I don't want--any of that, from you, thank you, sorry.' What was he even saying?

'But--' Zain reached for him. Harry sidestepped him hugely.

'No, no, you should probably go,' he said, and then escaped.

He nearly tripped down the stairs, feeling how hot his cheeks had gotten. What a fucking joke.

Whoever was knocking was now doing some kind of rhythmic beat against the paneling and humming along. Harry listened, slowing as he neared the door. It sounded a bit familiar, sort of like--

He threw open the door.

'You know, Harold, I can't decide if I'm more offended that you didn't tell anyone where you were going or that you honestly thought I wouldn't be able to find you,' said Lou, now tapping out the bridge to 'Keep You.' Bloody awful song. It still had the power to make him cringe, after all these years.

'Louisa,' said Harry, with deep relief. She grinned cheekily, waving a pink fine.

'I see you've become a petty criminal in my absence. I always knew you were--' 

His hug lifted her off the ground. She smelled of detergent, that awful chamomile and--ah, El was back on her medical marijuana. 

'Whoof, alright, alright, that's quite enough, let me down, ' she said, laughingly swatting him. He put her down. 'There's a lad.' She patted him on the cheek twice and peered at him.

'We alright then?' Ah, Lou and her royal we's.

'We're fine,' said Harry, not thinking about the kid upstairs, this miserable house, this awful town, his ruined career. He felt his smile slip into something a bit more fragile and quickly bent to hide his face in her neck. 'No, we're fine.'

'You're going to get my top wet with all that blubbering, you twat,' Lou whispered some time later, nevertheless rubbing his back.

'Am I? 'M sorry,' he mumbled. 'Missed you, Lou.'

'You useless, foul-postured idiot,' she sighed into his hair, 'we miss you, too.'

The back door slammed.

**Author's Note:**

> If you're interested, the A-Side song is "Little Pleasures" by Tokimonsta; the B-Side song is "Vesânia II (Delírio Mútuo)" by Quarto Negro.


End file.
